Site: Lawrence County, Ohio Dark site
Date/time: 10/3 11:30 PM -10/4 2:30 AM
Equipment: 7 x 50 mm Orion Vista Bino’s
Discovery Telescopes 10” f 5.6 Dob on a Compact Equatorial Platform
Aids: Sky Atlas 2000, Night Sky Observers Guide, observing lists made with the “Sky Tools” software package (CapellaSoft – www.skyhound.com)
Weather: was above the river fog ( … Why it’s the second highest place in Lawrence County.), dew appeared after 12:45 AM . Cool. Say upper 60’s. Sky’s supported up to 200x, most of the time less. Saw to at least mag 5.5 EP’s: 26 mm Plossl (55x), 18 mm Meade superwide (79x), 16 mm Konig (88x), 7 mm Nagler (203x), 2” 32 (44x) and 40 (35x) mm konigs
On vacation, clouds coming later in the week, so I headed out alone to the “dark sky site”. Began by touring Cygnus and Perseus with the bino’s. Hit Jupiter, Saturn, and the Pleiades.
Auriga had risen by the time I had the scope set up so I decided to tour the open clusters there after visiting Jupiter and Saturn which were still fairly low in some unsteady air.
I’m not used to dark skys and was happy to discover that I could see the clusters in my 8X 50 mm finder (University Optics with Amici prism). Usually I can’t use this because of dew, but this didn’t dew over until about 1 AM which was a treat.
Centered M38 in the finder and there it was in the EP. Rated at mag 6.4. it appears to be a loose, rich cluster. Observed with 26 and 18 mm.
NGC 1907 was nearby and found while roaming the margins of M38 at low to moderate power. Observed with 18 and 7 mm. Faint, tight seen as a concentrated haze at the periphery of M38 at lower powers (26 mm). Pop’ed in the 16 mm and could see good detail in central concentration of star with averted vision. View was best with the 18 at about 80x. This was an unexpected jewel.
M36 was located with finder and observed with the 18 and 26. Loose open cluster with a moderate # of stars. Better framed in the 18.
M37 Observed with 16, 18, 26. Preferred views with 16 and 18. In the 16 the view was dimmer yet the contrast was improved. But this EP lacks much eye relief. This is a diffuse open cluster with a moderate # of stars.
Observed Pleiades with the 26, 32, and 40. View best in 32.
Jupiter showed edge detail in the lower (northern) equatorial band and the upper (southern band appeared as two bands). Seeing was variable, had glimpses of more rings esp. in the North..
Saturn showed Cassini’s division and one clear planetary band and some texture. Tonight showed how special the conditions were last week when I could view these at 406x.
I turned to NCG 6825 the “blinking planetary” in Cygnus. I could not find this at home yesterday. I saw it blink. Amazing. Preferred views in the 18 to those in the 16 or 26. Spent a while bouncing my eye between the planetary’s bright central star and its fairly bright neighbor to observe the blinking effect.
I visited the Ring Nebulae (7,18,26), the double cluster (16,18,26,40 plossl (1.25” not the 2” Konig), Andromeda galaxy and M110 (16, 18, 26).
On to more OC’s in Lacerta. NCG 7243 is a rich OC (18,26). NGC 7209 is more diffuse and harder to define from the relatively rich stellar background.
Nearby is dark nebulae B168. This appeared as a large area of stellar void with a few field stars in front of parts of it. I put in the 32 and 40 to get a larger FOV to see it. I deluded myself into thinking that I saw a glimmer of faint diffuse nebulosity in the expected location of the Cocoon nebulae.
It’s a short hop over to M39 a loose sparse OC. Observed with 32 and 40.
I return to Jupiter and Saturn. Time for bed.